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Once again the American people are faced with across the board cuts to federal spending that will undoubtedly trickle down to negatively affect the growing “middle class” by increasing taxes and lowering services.

The elected leaders of our country, after years of uncontrolled spending and corporate pandering, now expect the American public to place their children’s education and the nation’s health on the line to help pay for their inability to effectively and efficiently manage our resources.

“The current salary (2013) for rank-and-file members of the House and Senate is $174,000 per year.

The median personal wealth for members of Congress grew to $911,510 in 2009, up from $785,515 in 2008, according to the Center for Responsive Politics. Nearly half of the members of Congress are millionaires.”

With 535 Representatives earning $174,000 the American people are paying our elected officials more than $93,090,000 in salary which does not include benefits. This is in addition to the money they receive from retirement payments.

The first sequester brought about a Congressional pay “freeze” which amounted to a savings of $856,000.

However, since Congress got us into our debt problems it is only reasonable to expect them to get us out by refusing their entire $174,000 salary until the federal budget becomes more manageable.

Instead, the American people will be convinced that legislators are doing everything they can to stop the uncontrolled spending which mean, educators, who make an average of $53,000 a year, must take a pay cut or loose their jobs in order to help bolster the economy.

In the meantime, corporate takeover of health, education, and incarceration are forcing our nation’s children into a lifetime of slavish servitude to a 21st Century workforce, running after the “middle class” carrot that is getting smaller and smaller as the “middle class” grows.

Until we understand that an excellent, child centered, experiential, developmentally appropriate education is the only answer to the myriad of social and economic problems we face in America, we will remain enslaved to the system of capitalism that has devoured the democratic system of government upon which our country was founded.

Who better to “examin[e] everything from teacher recruitment and performance, to whether the current school calendar is appropriate, and how the state’s more than 700 school districts are structured” than a “retired Citibank Chair and Time Warner President Richard Parsons . . . the SUNY Chancellor Nancy Zimpher, State Education Commissioner John King, and the chairs of the Senate and Assembly Education committees, as well as private sector advocate[s] . . . Geoffrey Canada.” At least that is the thought process of Governor Cuomo.

This is the makeup and charge of Guomo’s newly appointed education commission that includes a banker, a businessmen, a lawyer, two politicians, and an educator thrown in for good measure.

It is unclear how, but the Governor expects this group to be more interested in the educational needs of children than “the priorities of the financial interests.” Cuomo also named Randi Weingarten to the panel with no response from the President of the American Federation of Teachers.

There are however no parents on the panel, no education advocates, no students, no in-class or even retired teachers or administrators on the panel, except for Geoffrey Canada. This is no surprise since this is almost the same make-up as the State’s Board of Regents.

Is there any wonder why our system of education is in the failing condition that it is? Both locally and in the State, businessmen, lawyers, and politicians are running the educational show and have been doing so for years. And for years, education, locally and in the State, has been failing our children miserably.

We, the people of the United States, have the ultimate say in the policies our elected officials create and the decisions they make. When our voices are not heard the educational failure our children experience is not attributable to those we elected, the onus is on us for continuing to re-elect the individuals who choose not to listen. Our voice is our vote, it is time we speak up.

Our children suffer educationally and because of the lack of an excellent education provided our society suffers with them.

While the district struggles with the controversy over the superintendent search process, more bad news emerges from the State. Our report card was released and we have again failed to educate 49% of our children. As well, only 36% of our schools are meeting expectations.

Who is responsible for this failure, everyone. Parents, students, teachers, administrators, the superintendent, School Board members, and the community.

Education is a serious business that we are not taking seriously. We concentrate on the business end of education while totally neglecting the research surrounding highly effective educational practices.

As a community, we continue to vote into office those who repeatedly make inefficient and ineffective decisions regarding our system of education. The most inefficient and ineffective decision the Board makes is the superintendent they hire to lead the district. These superintendents have yet to increase the graduation rate much above 50% for more than two decades.

Administrators are responsible for the culture and success of individual schools and yet only 36% of our schools seem to have adequate leadership. And, since it is the responsibility of the administrator to determine teacher competency through evaluation, where does that leave our students?

In all the finger pointing, no one seems to want to hold students accountable for their lack of success. It doesn’t matter if they do their homework or not. It doesn’t matter if they show proficiency at grade level or not. It doesn’t matter if they behave themselves or even pass a test. Students get pushed along at the elementary level until they hit the Seventh grade wall and are no longer passed on.

The most powerful piece in this puzzle, parents, is the least culpable. Being an effective parent is a learned behavior and because we are failing to teach our children how to be successful human beings, we also fail to teach them how to be successful parents. This is the vicious cycle that continues to enslave us to the failure of our system of education.

This weekend, March 30, thru April 2, 2012 Save Our Schools will be marching on Washington to “Take Our Message to Capitol Hill”.

Save Our Schools is a national movement to save public education. This movement began nearly a year ago as the siege of public education by private plunderers began to overtake this nation’s public schools replacing them with private and charter schools that sought to dissemble teacher unions, lower teacher’s pay, and take educational dollars away from the poorest of our children in urban settings.

Their first march on Washington brought national attention as citizens, comprised of parents, students, educators, and celebrities, gathered in the Mall behind the White House, marched, and then held conferences in order to organize and build.

Public education must remain public in order to insure that every child has the opportunity to succeed. Public education must also undergo a drastic systemic overhaul in order to insure that every child has the opportunity to succeed. The Save Our Schools movement seeks to create long term systemic change in education by giving educators a voice in the process.

Private and charter schools are not the answer but an exacerbation of the problem. They rob public school systems of educational dollars with no measure of accountability in place for their success or failure.

While the Save Our Schools movement is an important step on the road to education reform, before any true, fundamental, change can occur, there must be a united, collaborative effort between and among all stakeholder groups in education.

Parents, students, teachers, administrators, and education leaders must join together in one accord and fight against the current system of education that is destroying the future of our neediest children.

Marching on Washington, lobbying in Albany, protesting in Rochester, are all necessary and important steps that must be taken in order to effect change. If our leaders in education are not willing to take these steps, we, as a community, must ask, “How committed are you to our children’s educational success?”

Everyone knows and understands that the system of education must change before our children will be properly educated. Why has it taken so long for so many knowledgeable and capable groups to come together and affect that change?

Why are parents waiting for legislation that gives them the power that they already have in order to come to the aid of their children who are failing in a system designed to fail them?

This situation is no longer the fault of the School Board or educational leaders. This community is not standing up for its children but allowing rhetoric and irresponsibility to stand in the way of real action.

We fought for the right to vote our School Board into office and with the exception of Mary Adams, Board members were re-elected. This was not done with the expectation for change.

Outside extremist have done more to further the cause and bring adults to justice in the Jada Williams case than the activist groups have right here in her own community. There were no marches on Central Office, no call for action, no petition to the State Education Department, no call tree to State Ed Commissioner John King, no 310 Appeal filed.

This community complains that the Board of Education makes decisions irrespective of its views or voice when in fact the Board makes its own decisions because the community refuses to stand together, support one another, and, in one accord, make their voice heard.

We have proven that actions speak louder than words. Those times when solidarity has awakened the Board to our cry we have been acknowledged. However, instead of pushing forward, we back off and then have to spend time regrouping for the next united effort. This is counterproductive to the cause of real systemic change and it is exhausting.

The Board of Education is not the problem here. The lack of commitment to action is the brick wall that stands in the way of our progress. Our children are dying while we discuss our next move. We must ACT NOW!

Last night more than one hundred children, parents, teachers, and community members gathered to join Rochester Parents United in support of Jada Williams and her family. This was the first of four rallies that will be held throughout Rochester.

The evening began with Rochester Parents United Vice-President Allen Williams, former School Board member, calling for parents to support “Parent Trigger” legislation.

Pastor Marlowe Washington invigorated the body telling parents to not just sit at the table, but to prepare the table. Pastor Marlowe eloquently stated that parents must begin to be more involved in their children’s education. Parents must take an active role in the system of education for our children.

Ernest Flagler-Mitchell, President of RPC and former candidate for School Board, spoke next to explain Parent Trigger legislation, its options, and how parents can use the law to create a new system of education for our children. Joined by a coalition of parents from Buffalo, New York, Mr. Mitchell advocated for the “take over” of the district by parents.

Parent Trigger legislation is supported by Assemblyman David Gantt and RPU hopes to receive the support of Senator Joe Robach. Parent Power organizer Carrie Remis is working closely with RPU to refine Parent Trigger legislation to remove some of the roadblocks parents in other states have met.

At the end of the rally, the floor was opened to comments and questions from the community. Several parents spoke about the problems they have had with the district. Howard Eagle, CETF member spoke in support of RPU presenting a united front to effect widespread, fundamental change in the system of education.

NAACP President Edward Goolsby also spoke in support of Jada Williams and made it clear that the NAACP is involved in protecting Jada’s civil rights on a national level. Mr. Goolsby also noted that voting for our educational leaders was an important part of the process.

The next RPU rally will be held on April 16, at the Frederick Douglass Resource Center, 36 King St., from 6:30-8:30 PM.

Today, March 19th from 6:30pm until 8:30pm at the Cross of Christ Deliverance Temple, 597 North Goodman Street, there will be a rally to support Jada Williams. There is a great deal of controversy concerning this issue and whether the comments this young girl made in her essay were racist. Unfortunately, the crime that was committed was lost amidst the issue of racism.

This community must realize that to support the denial a young Black girl’s civil rights is to support the denial of a mature White woman’s civil rights. Freedom of speech belongs to everyone. We do not have the right to pick and choose who gets to say what they believe or feel and who does not.

We must realize that there is no good reason to support wrong. Wrong is wrong regardless of age, race, gender, affiliation, or allegiance. Harming another human being is wrong. Denying another human being their right to speak freely without fear of retribution is wrong. Not supporting Jada Williams is wrong.

There are no shades of gray when discerning right from wrong. There are no mitigating circumstances, no reasons, no causes. To support the wrongdoing of some is to cause the breakdown of justice for everyone. Once wrong is supported for any reason, for anyone, it can be supported for every reason, for everyone.

We cannot allow this precedent to be set. What Jada’s teacher did was wrong. The principal of Nathanial Rochester School #3 was wrong when she supported the teacher. The superintendent was wrong when he supported the adults in this situation and the School Board was wrong when they supported the superintendent.

This community must realize that in order to change the problems within our system of education, our community, our nation, we must look beyond issues of race, creed, color, money, and politics and determine our course of action based on what is right. What is right for our children, our community, our nation.

Support Jada Williams! It is imperative that we teach our children that what is wrong is never right.